Jeremy Lin-sanity spreads to social networks

Twitter and social networks are awash in “Lin-sanity,” according to two new reports out today.

Jeremy Lin, the suddenly sensational point guard of the New York Knicks, generated about 2.6 million mentions on Twitter and on social media last week, according to the social analytics firm General Sentiment.

That was more than Kobe Bryant, LeBron James and seven of the NBA’s other most elite players combined,

Not only that, the Pride of Palo Alto handily beat out the 1.9 million social media mentions and tweets about President President Barack Obama for the week of Feb. 6 to 14.

On Twitter alone, Lin’s account, @JLin7, edged James’ @KingJames by more than 20,000 mentions, according to General Sentiment.

The big driver was Lin’s 38-point performance against Bryant’s L.A. Lakers last Friday night. Lin received about 1.2 million social media and Twitter mentions. And the nationally televised game drew more than 3 million viewers, the biggest audience for a Friday night NBA game this season, according to NM Incite.

The research firm, a Nielsen/McKinsey company, also released similar findings about “The Jeremy Lin Effect” on social media that said Lin had more mentions than James, Bryant and the Knicks combined.

“Half of the conversation about Lin has been positive, with associated topics including humor (23 percent of Lin’s buzz), “LinSanity” (22 percent) and comparisons to veteran NBA players Kobe Bryant and LeBron James (17 percent),” according to a blog post from the Nielsen/McKinsey company.